Wednesday, 12 December 2012

Post-Exam Wrap-Up

I thought of making this post about the long-ago kendo competition, but I can't write a post that requires me to show happiness while I'm doing all I can not to break down in tears.

You see, I got THE RESULTS (the one that determines your university) today.

And being me, I'm focusing on my weakest point, or to put it another way, my lowest score. Maths.

Even though I've done math for the past 12 years. And even though my marks weren't that terrible in Singapore, I'm still the worst in class now. Which effectively ruins my chances to go to my dream university.

I could say that it's because we're not allowed formula sheets in the exam (and talk about how unnecessary that is, since with the internet, looking up formulas is easy).

I could say it's because we weren't allowed calculators (in which case, what is the calculator for)

I could give a lot of excuses, but they're just that. Excuses. I'm the one that did badly, I'm the one that can't do math, and I shouldn't be blaming it on a different system.

So to all my future juniors, let this be one piece of advice to you. Although I love to encourage you guys to apply, before you come, think about how good you are with academic pressure. Sure, come here and have fun, but make sure you're ok with studying hard, or you're ok not going to a brand-name university.

And on a related note, here's a piece of information I was told today. One of the scholars got expelled for cheating - twice. If you cheat once, I could say that you're under pressure. If you cheat twice, it makes me think you have nothing but contempt for the system. And right now, having studied so hard but did so badly, I have no sympathy for cheaters.

In other words, don't come here if you can't study.

Right now, I'm just sad. I feel like I'm letting my Junior College (that's high school for most of you) down. I see my friends going to Harvard, to Cambridge, to Kings, to Hong Kong Univeristy, to NUS, and here I am, struggling. My school was tough, and we have a winner mindset. So now that I feel like I'm letting my school down, I feel just terrible.

And I have this up ahead:

University applications.

Frankly, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm going to have to rethink everything.

2 comments
:

I'm sorry to hear that went badly for you. I know how it is to work really hard for something and still miss the mark you were aiming for. I hope that with time and reflection you can find a valuable lesson learned here, and I don't mean something obvious (and negative) like "study harder". I believe everything happens for a reason, and when one door closes, another opens. Good energy to you moving ahead. :)